*

Offline xeres

  • *
  • 15
  • 0
  • Camps in backyard!
    • View Profile
Flooring & Bed Install
« on: August 21, 2016, 02:22:10 am »
Last August I bought the CaveVan Official Flooring and tore out a bed/bench from a 1993 for install into our 2002 salvage EuroVan. My husband and I have some definite ideas of what to do with the van, of course it's been a lot of back and forth.   A few things got in the way (thank you Valley Fire 2015), but now I have time for some pictures and notes.

Bed/bench Notes:  Sanding rust and painting every metal piece of the bench frame & storage boxes was fine. I like painting. On the other hand, cleaning the seat itself was a chore I don't want to repeat! It took two days with a carpet/vac cleaner from the hardware store. I intend(ed) to reupholster the bench and seats in a retro green plaid as the van is a tan interior and the grey seat simply doesn't match.

Flooring Notes: Seeing a few posts on the Interwebs about the carpet being glued to the floor, I expected a mess in removing it. Big surprise, the only glued section was around the floor vent (and not very much). We decided to keep the option for installing the seat behind the driver. This meant cutting holes in the plywood and vinyl. The holes edges are beveled to allow the flooring to be gently pulled into the well created by the bolts/posts (no sharp edge to cut the flooring). You can see one of the seat posts in the floor in the third picture.

Disagreement ensued with the method of attaching the flooring to the plywood. I am a chemist. He is an engineer. I wanted adhesive. He went with fasteners along the edges (basically screw/washers painted the same color as the flooring. Several months later I could point out why this was not a good idea... My intent was to pull the bench out and glue this over this summer but fixing the fire damage took priority (FYI, we won the fire lottery and still have a home). So, the floor is still fastened mechanically.

Once the flooring was installed, the bench and storage boxes went in easily. The van is now usable for light camping and hauling people and/or things.